ESFLIB: A library to compute the element free Galerkin shape functions Original Research Article

We present a library for the computation of the shape functions for the element free Galerkin (EFG) method. While the EFG method is in many respects strikingly similar to the finite element method, the construction of the shape functions for the EFG method is much more complicated than in the FEM. Thus, the question arises whether it is possible to encapsulate the complexity of the shape function construction process, while providing a simple interface to the shape function data. We present a shape function library design which proved unrestrictive (it can be used with almost any programming language without any special requirements on application program data structures), highly configurable, and robust.